The first car was handed over to the target protected area of the SNPA-Project

25.05.2018

After a long starting period of the KfW Project „Support to Protected Areas in Ukraine“, the first car for one of the eight target parks of the project was handed over on 23rd May 2018 in Kyiv. The handover procedure was held within the frame of the 15th-anniversary celebration of the Carpathian Convention. The car, a Renault Duster 4WD, was handed over to the administration of the Carpathian Biosphere Reserve which holds large tracts of old-growth and primeval forests, many of them belong to the UNESCO Natural World Heritage.

The Reserve’s area is 53,000 ha and it is divided into several clusters – hence the need for low-cost and reliable transport for the park’s administration. This helps in times where funds for the protected areas budget in Ukraine are restricted to salary and basic law enforcement expenses. Currently, only outdated equipment is available for park rangers or administrative staff, sometimes even private cars are used in parks.

The symbolic key was handed over by the SNPA project to Mykola Rybak, the Biosphere Reserve’s Director. This one car hand over is only a start, as part of the KfW project it is aimed to purchase 39 4WD cars for all eight target parks, with the aim to upgrade the ranger and law-enforcement activities.